Workshop of the Swiss Society for Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy, September 12–13, 2014, Swiss Institute of Comparative Law, Lausanne

Kurztext

Climate change belongs to the most pressing environmental problems we are facing today. Despite the agreement reached by the 2015 United Nations Climate Conference, this problem will remain on top of the political agenda during many years to come. This volume presents the proceedings of the workshop held at the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law, Lausanne, in 2014. The main objective was to engage a dialogue between philosophers and lawyers on three intricate questions related to the environmental crisis: first, what is the very nature of this crisis? In what way does it confront human beings to the limits of the biosphere, and to their own finitude? Second, how should we conceive of responsibility towards future generations from a legal as well as from a moral point of view? Third, how to interpret the principle of common but differentiated responsibility, which plays a key role in environmental law and ethics? How to apply criteria such as the ‘polluter pays’, the ‘ability to pay’, or the ‘beneficiary pays’ principle in the face of empirical data of CO2 emissions in various countries and with a view on mitigation and adaptation?

Autoren

Alain Papaux is ordinary professor of philosophy of law, legal methodology and philosophy of environmental law at the University of Lausanne Law Faculty and Geosciences and Environment Faculty. He obtained his master of law at Lausanne, his master of philosophy at Geneva, his master of philosophy of law at Brussels (St-Louis) and his PhD at the University of Lausanne and held positions at the European Academy of Legal Theory, Brussels, before returning to Lausanne in 2003. His areas of specialization are the philosophy of environmental law and juridical methodology.

Simone Zurbuchen is ordinary professor of early modern, modern and contemporary philosophy at the University of Lausanne. Having obtained her PhD and her habilitation at the University of Zurich, she was a member of the Interdisciplinary Institute for Ethics and Human Rights at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland) before taking up her current position in 2012. Her areas of specialization are early modern history of political philosophy and philosophy of law and contemporary political philosophy.